


Boomerang

by Skullbubble



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Adventure, Asra uses he/him pronouns but is unspecific below the belt, Fluff, Gen, Gender-Neutral Apprentice (The Arcana), Multi, Other, Smut, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, a Camio cameo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:13:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27725321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skullbubble/pseuds/Skullbubble
Summary: In which Faust goes away and comes back again, and Asra thinks a herpetologist is someone who studies STIs.
Relationships: Apprentice & Asra (The Arcana), Apprentice/Asra/Muriel (The Arcana), Apprentice/Muriel (The Arcana), Asra & Faust (The Arcana), Faust & Inanna (The Arcana)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 48





	Boomerang

Takes place after [Mushroom](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27674183).

* * *

Asra is dozing above the shop - warm and still slightly pissed. He hears the door downstairs open, close, a gentle bump letting him know someone’s there.

As soon as the floorboards creak under his feet, he hears a gentle thumping start from from the floor below.On the stairs he finds that the thumping noise has brought a friend - a smell like rotten logs and pond water with base notes of damp carpet and a hint of...bergamot?The thumping goes on rhythmically, faster and more insistent as he makes his way down.

Inanna is waiting for him, wagging excitedly, her tail thumping against the counter. Her coat is damp and smeared with something the colour of bird droppings.There is orange peel and wilted lettuce stuck to it. 

Asra immediately forgets all of this because in her mouth is-

“Faust!”

Faust’s head and tail wiggle animatedly but the middle of her body is ramrod straight.Inanna carefully puts her down in front of him and sits down.

Faust rolls back and forth on the floor like a rolling pin, pushing herself over and over with her tail.

_ Play! _

“Faust, what happened to you?”

Asra picks her up gingerly and feels her midsection.There’s something long and hard inside her but she seems otherwise fine.

_ Throw! _

Whatever is in there doesn’t seem to have any give and won’t bend.He tries looking down her throat but can’t see anything.He should take her to a doctor.A snake doctor.A snoctor? Do those exist?He briefly imagines Faust in a little white coat.

Julian’s a doctor, perhaps he can help.Or Muriel.Muriel’s good with animals. 

But right now, Asra can’t ask Muriel.He can’t carry on as if their encounter in the forest never happened.Not with the sudden flutter in his heart and the warmth from his face spreading down through his stomach to pool between his legs and settle there, reaching its paws out to knead his hot flesh into shape.“Hi, Muriel, long time no see. Yesterday? No, I was somewhere else entirely.I definitely didn’t turn up at your hut and accidentally see you naked with the most breathtaking post-coital flush, why do you ask?Can you give me a hand? My snake is hard.”

No, he can’t ask Muriel.

Sensing some distress, Inanna shuffles closer to him until she can press her damp chin along his thigh and look up at him pleadingly, tail wagging harder than ever.She starts licking his free hand to comfort him, leaving warm slobber flecked with bits of vegetable.Asra absently wipes the hand on his shirt.He smells of dog, rotting vegetation and...

“...cucumber.It’s a cucumber, isn’t it?”

Faust seems delighted.

_ I am become stick ! _

She stretches her nose and tail out as straight as she can.

“And you want me to throw you for Inanna.”

_ Wheeeeee! _

“Faust, I am not going to throw you,” he says gently.“You need a snoctor.”

_ Whyyyyyyyyyy? _

“Because the cucumber’s blocking all of your...internals and you need to eat real food.”

She tries to hang onto his arm but the cucumber won’t bend, so instead settles for flopping about dramatically to express her disappointment.

“Inanna, can you take her to Muriel?Maybe he can help.I...need to deal with something here.”He places Faust delicately in Inanna’s jaws.She trots out of the shop, taking the smell and most of the orange peel with her.

Asra waits politely until her tail has passed the threshold, then slams and locks the door, and races back up the stairs.He’s sure Faust will be fine and, right now, he  really  needs to take his trousers off and rub himself against something so he can stop thinking about yesterday get on with the rest of his day.

* * *

Faust and Inanna will visit Muriel later.For now they have important work to do.

They met yesterday, while Asra was looking for trouble.Inanna showed her how to roll in the dirt, then took Faust to all of the best stagnant puddles and slime-filled hollows around the forest.They carefully documented each one by rolling in it, then sampled the buffet from a selection of rotting logs.

They decided to make a guide to all of their favourite places so others can enjoy them too.They came into the city this morning for some alfresco dining.After visiting the waterfront just after the boats came in, so they could get to the fish guts before the rush, they moved to the South Market for a medley of discarded vegetables. 

That was where Faust had found it.Her prize.

It was fresh - fresh-ish - and it called out to her, bringing back fond memories of the time she ate a whole potato then burrowed into the ancient strata of Asra’s laundry pile and slept there for three days dreaming about stones.

The cucumber spoke to her, promising secrets.She couldn’t chew so she unhinged her jaw and daintily swallowed it whole over a period of several minutes.She felt the envy of the crows who could only dream of such feats.

_ And it had bestowed its secrets.  _

_ And she had her plan. _

But she couldn’t slither so Inanna had to carry her to the shop.

* * *

>   
> Now they are gone, and Asra is drowning in glory.
> 
> Eyes closed, sheets beneath him.He is in the house in the forest, laid in front of the fire.Behind is Muriel, one arm looped around him, holding his body close.Muriel is inside him, laying still, just letting himself be carried away as Asra moves.
> 
> In front is his apprentice, riding Muriel’s fingers.Their hands in Asra’s hair, lips around his tongue, fingers trailing down past his navel to touch and rub and stroke.
> 
> Asra melts away between the two of them.
> 
> Muriel is the first.He jerks and shudders, emptying himself into Asra, face pressed into his shoulder and clutching him tighter.Though spent for now, he does not pull away.
> 
> Asra laces his fingers with Muriel’s, holding onto him like an anchor.Something is drawing tighter and tighter inside his belly, contracting into a single impossible point.With every touch, he thinks it can’t wind any further, that it has to give, this has to be it.But the thing keeps going and it’s almost painful, so hot and bright like a star, until all at once it bursts, racing outward, a wave flooding through him, washing everything else out of his limbs but this feeling.He is so full of joy, so full of love, so awash with peace and warmth that he can’t contain it all and it comes spilling from his eyes.His body feels...perfect, victorious.
> 
> Asra can’t explain why he is crying because he can’t stop smiling. He is beyond words.
> 
> Still clutching Muriel, he reaches out to the apprentice, to stroke them softly along with him, up into this golden place where there is only perfect peace. 
> 
> “Asra.Asra.Asra.”He tastes his name between their lips, soft on his tongue.
> 
> _ Thank you.Thank you so much... _
> 
> He didn’t realise his belly could feel happy, or that his tears could stroke his face like kisses, or that his mouth could become a corona of soft warmth and it’s shuddering through him again, almost too much to take. He can’t think, can’t speak, can’t move.All he can do is feel.
> 
> “Asra.”
> 
> His name...

* * *

_ “Asra. Asra? ASRAAAA!” _

His name. The apprentice is calling his name from downstairs, not in the soft tones of his dream but bellowing like an ox stuck in a ditch.

He is not in Muriel’s hut.He is at the shop, stuck to the bed.

“Why are you yelling? Just come upstairs.” he yells back.

_ “You left your trousers down here and I thought you might be busy!” _

Oh. _Oh._

“Okay, I’m coming!”

_ “That’s what I thought!” _

“ No, I’m coming downstairs.”

_ “Yeah, I guessed you came down here too because you left your trousers behind.” _

The last of the dream’s warm spell slips softly away like a slug down a drainpipe, taking his passion with it.All the rosy afterglow in the world can’t stand up to someone yelling innuendos loud enough to be heard across the street.

Asra peels himself away from the blanket, decidedly sticky below the waist.He wipes himself down with today’s shirt, trying to avoid the patch where he smeared Inanna’s drool because the last thing he needs is more fluids to add to the mess he’s already made-

_ “Asra!” _

Should he go down as he is, completely naked?That would stop the yelling. 

_ “I have a present for you!” _

Asra gives in.He wraps a scarf around himself like a skirt and then makes his way downstairs to find the apprentice and-

“Faust!Faust, what happened to you?”

She looks up at him tragically from the counter.Where her body had been straight this morning, she is now bent into an elbow shape.

* * *

Faust and Inanna head up the hill to the palace to find more material for their guide. Faust dangles in Inanna’s jaws, happily watching the world go by.Nobody pays them a second look.   
They have almost reached the top when they see the bird strutting along an awning.White, with a crest of golden feathers, it looks at them with one mad red eye and speaks.

“NODDY, DID YOU HEAR WHAT SHE SAID?NODDY, ARE YOU LISTENING?”

The eye closes slowly, opens again. 

“WHERE ARE MY SHOES?”

Inanna opens her mouth to say something back, and Faust drops.

Slowly at first, she begins to roll.

It’s early enough in the day that she is unimpeded by crowds, bouncing across the cobbles and turning over and over and over andoverandoverandover, picking up speed down the street.Inanna is charging after her, bird forgotten.

To understand the stick, you must become the stick.The cucumber has taught Faust well.At this moment, she has become the stick, because a stick is not _truly_ a stick until it is chased.Faust feels this in each of her bones and is at peace.

* * *

“So I found her like this under a flower stall,” his apprentice explains.“I think the cucumber broke in half but I have no idea what she was doing.”

Asra strokes her head softly.“Inanna brought her here earlier and I sent them to find Muriel, I thought he could help. How are we going to get the cucumber out now?”

“Get it out?Just leave it in.She’ll digest it eventually and then she’ll be fine.”

Faust is a sad boomerang now that the cucumber is broken.She can’t straighten out but can’t curl up either.

“Heeeey, there there.” Asra coos, “How about I let you sleep on my sock pile and once you’re feeling better I can make you a big bowl of scrambled eggs, with ham and peas and loads of butter, and you can sleep in that too?”

Faust bends herself around as best she can, touching her tail to her nose.

_ Heart _

“That’s the spirit!”

Asra drapes her over his shoulder.

“I saw Inanna when i found this one.” The apprentice boops Faust’s nose. “But as soon as I smelled little Faust here and used the word ‘bath’, she was gone. She usually stays away when Muriel is counting chickens.”

“Count the...why was he counting the chickens?”

“It makes him feel peaceful ... Oh I don’t think he’s _really_ counting them, I think that’s just what he _says_ he’s doing.He likes to make sure they’re all okay.They aren’t his chickens, they’re their own chickens, but they’re his friends so he looks out for them.It might also just be an excuse for him to gently cuddle them one at a time because he likes how soft they are.You know, when it gets cold in the winter, he lets them come into the hut to keep warm and they all snuggle around him during the night like a big mother hen.Sometimes he loses track of which ones have had cuddles and which haven’t so he has to start all over again.”

Asra might just melt onto the floor.

“Never tell him I told you or he’ll get all bashful and run away to live as a bear or something.”

* * *

When the shop is empty again, everything feels profoundly normal, like a spell has been broken.

When Asra thinks of the apprentice, there is no pooling of heat in his groin or flutter in his chest.All that comes to mind is good natured yelling. 

When he thinks of Muriel, the lust is gone.Instead he imagines his friend sitting on the floor of his hut - picking up each chicken, hugging it softly, kissing its head, then releasing it, not noticing when it runs around behind him to queue up for another go.

**Author's Note:**

> Is it called an elbow because it bows into an L ?


End file.
